NASA just released photos of clouds on Mars and they are breathtaking

Last NASA images published on their website are especially beautiful. They are part of the Martian cloud map that the Curiosity rover has been compiling since January. His task is not over yet, as he will continue to take these types of photographs. till March. However, some of them have already been published, as interesting as those that he shot last February during sunset on mars

If these NASA images are striking, it’s because the clouds on Mars are usually not very high. As the space agency explains, they don’t usually go higher. 60 kilometers high and consist of ice water. These, on the other hand, are much higher and may contain frozen carbon dioxide, better known as dry ice.

This image was taken on February 2nd and is striking in that it also perfectly shows the sun’s rays illuminating the cloud bank. They have never been photographed so clearly on the red planet. But in the publication there are more images from NASA, belonging to the same project. For example, you can also see some beautiful rainbow clouds that can help you get information about composition of the atmosphere of Mars. Because, as we always talk about NASA images, it’s not just wallpaper material. They also carry a lot of information, very useful for those who know how to interpret it.

What are these NASA pictures for?

With this 3 month project Curiosity makes mapping of twilight and nighttime clouds of Mars. That is, those that are formed during sunsets and after them.

Just like on Earth, studying clouds can be very helpful in understanding the atmosphere they are in. For this reason, with all this data, they hope to learn more, both about its composition and about red planet climate

The Curious Case of Rainbow Clouds

The second NASA image just released contains rainbow cloud feather-shaped Captured 27 January. It is said to be iridescent because you can see the colors of the rainbow on it. And that also makes it interesting to study the Martian atmosphere.

The reason is that for such iridescence to occur, the particle sizes must be identical to the sizes of all their neighbors. However, as the colors change, it is clear that particle size it is too. Therefore, interesting information about the formation of clouds can be obtained, as one of the scientists of the project explains in a statement released by NASA, Mark Lemon.

For now, Curiosity will continue to take cloud images on Mars until the end of March. Then they will have to be processed and, who knows, maybe new photos will appear, as bright as those just published. At the moment, they are a good example that the rover, which arrived on Mars in 2012, is still at full strength and ready for new missions.